Skylanders: Imaginators

A day after launching Spyro’s Adventure, the inaugural release in the Skylanders series, developer Toys for Bob was bombarded with a common request from fans.

“They wanted to make their own Skylanders,” says Lou Studdert of Activision’s production team. “They sent us art of what their Skylanders looked like, and info on how they played, what they sounded like, and what their catch phrases were. They came up with all of those things that we spend so much time making a Skylander out of; they wanted that power. This year we are giving them that power.”

The ability to create your own Skylanders may sound like a joke, since the survival of this series depends on selling figures, but that’s exactly what Toys for Bob is doing in Skylanders Imaginators. Players can still purchase new characters at retail, but Toys for Bob is hoping they also buy in on a new physical item called the Creation Crystal.

When this item is placed on the Portal of Power for the first time, a character doesn’t appear. Instead, you are warped to a character-creation menu where you design your own Skylander. That character’s data is saved to the Creation Crystal, an ordinary-looking glass tube with a small, colored “Imaginite” element inside of it.

Only one character can be saved to each Creation Crystal, meaning you need to buy 10 different Crystals if you want to create a character for each of the 10 elemental types featured in the game.

The creation process begins with the player selecting a battle class from 10 options, such as ninja or smasher. Combining the 10 classes with the 10 elemental types gives players 100 options out of the gate. Next up is the customization phase, which is broken down into body, gear, color, powers, and personality options. These categories give way to a wealth of fun choices.

The body sculpting allows players to mix and match heads, arms, legs, chests, eyes, and ears. The options cover the gamut, from bird and bug parts to snow and stink themes. The finer tweaks allow players to alter the size and color of the individual parts, as well as the voice and catch phrase (which can be assembled from a limited selection of words).

New customization items are unlocked through loot chests found in the levels, but may also be dropped randomly by enemies. The items that drop are also random, and fall into the common, rare, epic, and mythic categories. Some of the drops are tied specifically to battle classes.

If the proposal of a custom Skylander doesn’t interest you and you’d rather play the game in the traditional way with an action figure created by Toys for Bob, Skylanders Imaginators welcomes 31 new characters called Senseis. Standing in at roughly the same height as the Giants and Trap Team figures, the Sensei are some of the most powerful beings in Skylands, and they all favor black and gold outfit colors. They are the only characters capable of unleashing new special attacks called Sky Chi.

We were introduced to three Sensei: Master Kingpen, a giant penguin-like warrior; Master Tri-Tip, a triceratops wielding a mace; and Golden Queen, the sorcerer boss from Skylanders Trap Team.

She’s joined the Skylanders after being rehabilitated for two years. Studdert says other bosses will likely get figures, and didn’t rule out the idea of Kaos finally getting his due, even though he is the antagonist of this caper.

Following the success of the Nintendo guest stars in SuperChargers, Toys for Bob says Imaginators will have a special guest as well.

Outside of the custom characters and Sensei, Skylanders Imaginators follows the same gameplay we’ve seen in all of the other Skylanders games. All of the multiplayer racing content from SuperChargers is included in Imaginators, but the vehicles won’t have any effect on the campaign.

In the film Toy Story 3, we watched Andy grow into an adult and leave his toys behind. Skylanders Imaginators has apparently matured to that age, as the toys have been pushed to the side to make room for character creation. That’s right, this toys-to-life game is at its best when the action figures are left in the box, and players are using their imaginations to design their own warriors.

This is a strange move on developer Toys for Bob’s part, but the payoff is twofold: equally in empowering the player with ownership over their characters, and making the gameplay more rewarding through the addition of loot. Since this is a Skylanders game, the character-creation tools are linked to a physical product called the Creation Crystal. By placing this item on the Portal of Power, players can tweak just about every aspect of their monster, including appearance, gear, catch phrase, and more. The tools are easy to use, and the characters look just as colorful as any of Toys for Bob’s designs.

Skylanders’ purchasable goods have always been fair in design, but the Creation Crystal teeters on the edge of questionable practices. When a Crystal boots up, the first thing players must do is select the class of character. The classes, of which there are 10, make a huge difference in how the game is played. An archer or bazooka type are radically different than the knight or brawler, but there’s no grace period for experimenting; once you select a class, your decision is final and you cannot change it – you’ll need to buy another Crystal to try again.

I wasn’t happy with the first Skylander I made, and ended up shelving that figure to try another, an attempt that required another $10 Creation Crystal. If you do happen to design a character you are happy with, you can alter its appearance as much as you want, and you’ll end up doing this more than you think, thanks to the game showering you with loot. You’ll get it for everything: defeating waves of enemies, completing minigames, taking down bosses, finding secret areas – it’s a wonderful thing. Most of the loot is random, contained in chests and organized into rarity levels. Much like a Diablo game, it feels great to add a legendary weapon or armor piece to your avatar. A warning to parents: Skylanders Imaginators supports in-game microtransactions for loot, and their placement is overly aggressive, but players likely won’t have to buy anything unless they want full collections. I never once felt the need to purchase anything; I instead found myself overwhelmed by the number of chests that would accumulate through gameplay.

If you don’t unleash your creative talents, Skylanders Imaginators can be played just like any other Skylanders game. All of the action figures from previous games are still compatible, and you can also purchase new Sensei characters – the most powerful Skylanders yet.

The Senseis are large-scale figures, much like the Giants or Trap Masters, that can unlock unique zones and unleash a unique special attack. The push to buy more Sensei figures is again more aggressive than usual. Each time a new Sensei is added to the game, the level cap for all Sensei characters goes up by one. That’s a powerful motivator, but don’t think for a second that you need it. Level 20, the default cap, is more than enough to complete the game on normal. As creative as the themes are for the level designs, many are bogged down with simplistic box-pushing puzzles and uneventful stretches. A stage themed as an arcade mostly serves as a way for players to spend time with the game’s multitude of lackluster minigames and diversions.

Overworld navigation is often more interesting than any stage, thanks to a dramatic increase in the Skylanders’ movement speed, and this area opening up to offer more secrets, secondary objectives, and the addition of encounters. Combat is once again where Skylanders shines brightest, and it’s great in Imaginators. Toys for Bob throws caution to the wind with most encounters, often overwhelming players with powerful waves of foes, or powerful bosses that you have to chip away at.

As much as I enjoyed playing as my own created character, the collector in me felt like something was missing. Part of what makes Skylanders great is the action figure element. A tube containing a glowing rock isn’t nearly as cool as a beautifully sculpted monster.

Even with players receiving a wealth of rewards, Skylanders Imaginators feels somewhat uninspired. Giving players creative control isn’t enough of a spark to make this experience shine.

When talking about games that could make our collector side show up, Skylanders Imaginators has to be mentioned, and if you enjoyed playing games like Disney Infinity gathering as many characters as you could or simply collecting Amiibos from Nintendo you won’t be disappointed. Developed by “Toy for Bob” and published by Activision in 2016 for Playstation 3, Playstation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Wii U, and Nintendo Switch later in 2017, this is the seventh game of the Skylander series and undoubtedly the best one.

Saving the world once again

The game follows the events of Skylanders SuperChargers after an era of peace that gets to an end when Kaos, the main villain, uses mind magic to brainwash the Skylanders and create an army of Doomlanders that will always try to stop us from finishing with Kaos plans.

What makes it special

This is an action/adventure game that’s also part of a genre not so often seen called “Toys-to-life” in which you will have to get the collectible figures with NFC integrated, called Sensei or Villains, all of them with their pretty unique weapons and abilities based on a certain element, and a portal to be able to play. And that’s not the only special thing about it, the best part is that the game is compatible with all the previous series figures over 30 different ones to collect, and among those characters like Crash Bandicoot, Dr. Neo Cortex, Bowser, and Donkey Kong.

Creating your Character

If you think that getting iconic characters is amazing, believe me, creating them is even beyond as this is the first game of the series that allows you to make your own Skylander if you buy a figure called Creation Crystal which comes in every element and not only allows you to customize all of his appearance, abilities, and weapons used but also the figure saves the information of the experience gained in order to make it every time stronger, how cool is that?

About the Gameplay

Fan of games like Crash Bandicoot and Spyro?

Well I can assure you it won’t let you down, from the combos to the platforms it will always meet your expectations and give you tons of hours of fun, and since you can play with Crash, you might end up feeling it as another game of the series.

Pros:

• A lot of in-game content
• It can take around 6 to 9 hours to complete
• The possibility to play with iconic characters of other games
• Multiplayer modes
• Character creation and customization

Cons:

• You need to have the portal and figures at all times to play (Unless you own a Switch)
• Very expensive

The fun and creativity that is inspired by Skylanders: Imaginators is second to none. As a lover of slightly unconventional gaming styles, the entirety of the Skylanders series has provided a fresh sense of life to the toys-to-life genre that has an essence hard to capture. The only other toy lines to truly rival Skylanders have been Nintendo’s Amiibo collection and LEGO Dimensions, of which Lego Dimensions is no longer being produced, unfortunately.

There are a lot of things that Skylanders does well in this installment, specifically surrounding the refined platforming aspects and the new figurines available to join your adventure, but it doesn’t come without its flaws. However, Imaginators does one add one character that is sure to draw in many players young and old: you.

Battle Against Mind Magic

The Skylanders series is not known for its engrossing plot/stories, but Imaginators does a fairly decent job of creating a dynamic, somewhat chaotic experience. Using your Skylander (any one of a number of characters, or even designing an avatar of yourself), its up to you and the other Portal Masters to put a stop to Kaos and other Doomlanders before they destroy the entirety of the Skylands. This story is fairly linear and predictable, but as I noted, this is not Skylander’s bread and butter. What makes this world come to life is being able to insert your own Skylands character into this action platforming adventure.

Beyond that, if you’re not too into collecting the overwhelming number of toys to play around with in-game, Skylanders will scare you off. This title supports over 300 old and new Skylanders toys and, in all honesty, can be an expensive hobby to keep up. Trying to collect each and every one could possibly lead you to insanity or even bankruptcy in a relatively short time period. In any case, its important to know what you’re getting into here, as it can get out of control fast.

Save the Skylands

The platforming in Imaginators is fun and ultimately lighthearted. It isn’t built on navigating each level with precision, dying hundreds of times to perfect a boss fight, or carving your own path. What makes Skylands special is the whole toys-to-life theme, the fact that there are hundreds of ways to approach each level (technically) and that you can explore a relatively huge world in a variety of ways. Above all else, this game is a lot of fun to play with your kids or younger players. This is not only because will they get a kick out of the enjoyable platforming aspects (it never gets too difficult) and seemingly limitless world/possibilities, but the real-life toys are just as fun to play with and spark their imagination.

There are some fun elements to the gameplay, specifically the various combat styles that come with different toys, but otherwise you’ll be focused on getting those new toys to actually try them out. Lastly, getting to level up the different Skylanders that you have, collecting different armor/power-ups, and battling hundreds of enemies are all done well enough. Its nothing crazy, and doesn’t introduce anything new compared to old installments, but it definitely looks the cleanest/crisp of them in terms of graphics and sound design too.

Pros:

• Welcoming/kid-friendly platforming
• Creative/Interesting levels
• Endless character possibilities/ways to play

Cons:

• Expect to invest a good amount of cash on toys
• Some skills for toy characters permanently locked when chosen
• Reworking some characters can be tedious since you need Imaginite (hard to get)